Sadly, the ceiling – despite its ornate central cornice and crystal-teardrop chandelier – failed to provide any answers.
Chapter 29
ELOISE TOOK longer than strictly necessary freshening up, conscious all the time of the dark cloud on the other side of the door. As she brushed her hair and reapplied her lipstick she wondered, not for the first time, where she and Jonathan had gone wrong with their youngest daughter. Chloe was so aimless and dependent, compared to Liv. So diffident and downbeat, compared to Noah.
Was it the divorce?
It had been a mess, and Chloe had been around to witness more of it than the other two, but she’d been twenty-two at the time – an adult – so surely it couldn’t have been that much of a formative experience? Eloise didn’t like to think about that period of their lives too much. There was still some residual shame. More shame for Jonathan of course, but she hadn’t been without fault. Seeing your parents lose all respect for each other – it must have been hard.
But in truth Chloe’s tendency to be easily knocked off-course, indeed never to find her true course, had been evident, way before Eloise and Jonathan’s marriage had imploded. She had always been unsure of herself.
Could it be that, as the baby of the family, they had spoiled Chloe, stunted her emotional development by expecting too little of her? Eloise tried to think back to Chloe’s childhood, but it was difficult. To be brutally honest – and Eloise found that since her divorce she favoured the unvarnished truth over polite dishonesty – she had only vague memories of Chloe as a child. By the time she came along, the novelty of being a parent had well and truly worn off. Chloe had been loved as much as her brother and sister – Eloise was sure of that – but her childhood milestones were less celebrated, less noticeable… fewer? She just seemed to ride along in Liv and Noah’s slipstream. By rights, Chloe should have been the most robust of the children, helped along by having older, confident siblings to learn from and mimic, but it hadn’t worked out that way.
The raw truth was that Chloe was insipid.
The unkindness of the thought gave Eloise pause. Her youngest daughter was grieving. Still lying prone on the bed in the adjoining room, waiting for someone to comfort and reassure her.
Eloise gave herself one last check in the mirror. An attractive but rather forbidding face looked back at her. She softened her expression and vowed to do better as a mother.
‘Darling.’ The endearment at least pulled Chloe upright. ‘I know these past few weeks have been hard on you. Being around your dad and seeing him so ill must have been awful. Truly awful. And I’m sure you were a great help and comfort to him. But we must look for small mercies in all this. He’s free of the pain now. You said yourself how much he hated being so… different, so limited in what he could do. And he wasn’t going to get any better, was he? Perhaps it’s a kindness it didn’t go on any longer.’
Eloise crossed the carpet and sat next to Chloe on the bed. Tentatively she reached out and stroked Chloe’s hair. It was short, cropped close to her head. Soft to the touch, more like fur than hair.
‘He would’ve hated to see you so down and depressed, sweetheart. He only ever wanted you to be happy.’ It was good to feel her daughter press her head against Eloise’s hand, accepting affection. It emboldened her. ‘He would’ve wanted you to spread your wings. Embrace the next stage of your life. Maybe now is the time for a fresh start, somewhere new. Why don’t you think about getting away from Scarborough and all these unhappy memories?’
She’d gone too far. She could tell immediately.
Chloe rolled away from her on the bed, swung her legs over the side and sat rigid on the edge of the mattress, looking away. Her voice, when she finally spoke, was cloggy with unshed tears. ‘Yes, well, that might be easier if everything wasn’t so up in the air.’
But Eloise persevered. ‘Yes, I can see that.’ Chloe was so quick to see a barred gate rather than the path beyond. ‘But I’m sure you’ll work something sensible out. Your dad obviously trusted the three of you to do the right thing or he wouldn’t have left it up to you, and Liv, and Noah.’
Chloe still looked truculent. Eloise patted her hand. Time for a change of venue and tempo – and a much-needed glass of something cold and crisp.
‘How about we go down to the bar for a quick drink before we head back up to the house? A chance for us to catch up properly without everyone else around?’ The bribe of time alone with Mummy: some things never changed!
Chloe smoothed the bedspread with her fingers, before eventually, grudgingly, saying, ‘Okay.’
Eloise slipped on some shoes and grabbed her bag, ready for an evening that was unlikely to be plain sailing.
Chapter 30
THEY HAD scattered like Arthur’s thrown chess pieces.
Chloe had insisted on going to the hotel with Eloise… to see her safely settled in. Their mother’s expression had clearly indicated that she had no need of such help. Of course their departure had given Noah the excuse he was looking for to slope off as well. He’d gone to buy more beer and wine – not that they needed any. He certainly didn’t. He had been slurry on Friday night, his anecdotes rambling to the point of incoherence. Watching him stumble his way upstairs at the end of the evening had made Liv feel an additional layer of itching frustration with him.
‘How about a kick-about in the garden?’ For an awful moment Liv thought Angus was asking her. But, of course, he meant the boys. They didn’t need asking twice, and in a flash they raced off in search
